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REFUTING MISSIONARIES

by Hayyim ben Yehoshua

PART 1: THE MYTH OF THE HISTORICAL JESUS

Much concern has been expressed in the Jewish media regarding the activity
of "Jews for Jesus" and other missionary organizations who go out of their
way to convert Jews to Christianity. Unfortunately, many Jews are ill equipped
to deal with Christian missionaries and their arguments. Hopefully this
article will contribute to remedying this situation.

When countering Christian missionaries it is important to base one's
arguments on correct facts. Arguments based on incorrect facts can easily
backfire and end up strengthening the arguments of the missionaries.

It is rather unfortunate that many well-meaning Jewish Studies teachers
have unwittingly aided missionaries by teaching Jewish pupils incorrect
information about the origins of Christianity. I can recall being taught
the following story about Jesus at the Jewish day school I attended:

"Jesus was a famous first century rabbi whose Hebrew name was Rabbi
Yehoshua. His father was a carpenter named Joseph and his mother's name
was Mary. Mary became pregnant before she married Joseph. Jesus was born
in a stable in Bethlehem during a Roman census. Jesus grew up in Nazareth
and became a learned rabbi. He traveled all over Israel preaching that
people should love one another. Some people thought that he was the Messiah
and he did not deny this, which made the other rabbis very angry. He caused
so much controversy that the Roman governor Pontius Pilate had him crucified.
He was buried in a tomb and later his body was found to be missing since
it had probably been stolen by his disciples."
A few years after being taught this seemingly innocent story, I became
interested in the origins of Christianity and decided to do some further
reading on the "famous Rabbi Yehoshua." Much to my dismay, I discovered
that there was no historical evidence of this Rabbi Yehoshua. The claim
that Jesus was a rabbi named Yehoshua and the claim that his body was probably
stolen both turned out to be pure conjecture. The rest of the story was
nothing more than a watered down version of the story which Christians
believe as part of the Christian religion but which is not supported by
any legitimate historical source.

There was absolutely no historical evidence that Jesus, Joseph or Mary
ever existed, let alone that Joseph was a carpenter or that Jesus was born
in Bethlehem and lived in Nazareth.

Despite the lack of evidence for Jesus's existence many Jews have made
the tragic mistake of assuming that the New Testament story is largely
correct and have tried to refute Christianity by attempting to rationalize
the various miracles that allegedly occurred during Jesus's life and after
his death. Numerous books have been written which take this approach to
Christianity. This approach however is hopelessly flawed and is in fact
dangerous since it encourages belief in the New Testament.

When the Israelites were confronted with the worship of Baal they did
not blindly accept the ancient West Semitic myths as history. When the
Maccabees were confronted with Greek religion they did not blindly accept
Greek mythology as history. Why do so many modern Jews blindly accept Christian
mythology? The answer to this question seems to be that many Christians
do not know themselves where the distinction between established history
and Christian belief lies and they have passed their confusion on to the
Jewish community. Browsing through the religion section of a local bookstore,
I recently came across a book which claimed to be an objective biography
of Jesus. It turned out to be nothing more than a summary of the usual
New Testament story. It even included claims that Jesus's miracles had
been witnessed but that rational explanations for them might exist. Many
history books written by Christians take a similar approach. Some Christian
authors will suggest that perhaps the miracles are not completely historical
but they nevertheless follow the general New Testament story. The idea
that there was a real historical Jesus has thus become entrenched in Christian
society and Jews living in the Christian world have come to blindly accept
this belief because they have never seen it seriously challenged.

Despite the widespread belief in Jesus the fact remains that there is
no historical Jesus. In order to understand what is meant by an "historical
Jesus," consider King Midas in Greek mythology. The story that King Midas
turned everything he touched into gold is clearly nonsense, yet despite
this we know that there was a real King Midas. Archaeologists have excavated
his tomb and found his skeletal remains. The Greeks who told the story
of Midas and his golden touch clearly intended people to identify him with
the real Midas. So although the story of the golden touch is fictional,
the story is about a person whose existence is known as a fact--the "historical
Midas." In the case of Jesus, however, there is no single person whose
existence is known as a fact and who is also intended to be the subject
of the Jesus stories, i.e. there is no historical Jesus.

When confronted by a Christian missionary, one should immediately point
out that the very existence of Jesus has not been proven. When missionaries
argue they usually appeal to emotions rather than to reason and they will
attempt to make you feel embarrassed about denying the historicity of Jesus.
The usual response is something like "Isn't denying the existence of Jesus
just as silly as denying the existence of Julius Caesar or Queen Elizabeth?"
A popular variation of this response used especially against Jews is "Isn't
denying the existence of Jesus like denying the Holocaust?" One should
then point out that there are ample historical sources confirming the existence
of Julius Caesar, Queen Elizabeth or whoever else is named, while there
is no corresponding evidence for Jesus.

To be perfectly thorough you should take time to do some research on
the historical personalities mentioned by the missionaries and present
hard evidence of their existence. At the same time you should challenge
the missionaries to provide similar evidence of Jesus's existence. You
should point out that although the existence of Julius Caesar, or Queen
Elizabeth, etc., is accepted worldwide, the same is not true of Jesus.
In the Far East where the major religions are Buddhism, Shinto, Taoism
and Confucianism, Jesus is considered to be just another character in Western
religious mythology, on a par with Thor, Zeus and Osiris. Most Hindus do
not believe in Jesus, but those who do consider him to be one of the many
avatars of the Hindu god Vishnu. Muslims certainly believe in Jesus but
they reject the New Testament story and consider him to be a prophet who
announced the coming of Muhammed. They explicitly deny that he was ever
crucified.

To sum up, there is no story of Jesus which is uniformly accepted worldwide.
It is this fact which puts Jesus on a different level to established historical
personalities. If the missionaries use the "Holocaust reply," you should
point out that the Holocaust is well-documented and that there are numerous
eyewitness reports. It should be pointed out that most of the people who
deny the Holocaust have turned out to be antisemitic hate-mongers with
fraudulent credentials. On the other hand, millions of honest people in
Asia, who make up the majority of the world's population, have failed to
be convinced by the Christian story of Jesus since there is no compelling
evidence for its authenticity. The missionaries will insist that the story
of Jesus is a well-established fact and will argue that there is "plenty
of evidence supporting it." One should then insist on seeing this evidence
and refuse to listen any further until they produce it.

If Jesus was not an historical person, where did the whole New Testament
story come from in the first place? The Hebrew name for Christians has
always been Notzrim. This name is derived from the Hebrew word neitzer,
which means a shoot or sprout--an obvious Messianic symbol. There were
already people called Notzrim at the time of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Perachyah
(c. 100 B.C.E.). Although modern Christians claim that Christianity only
started in the first century C.E., it is clear that the first century Christians
in Israel considered themselves to be a continuation of the Notzri movement
which had been in existence for about 150 years. One of the most notorious
Notzrim was Yeishu ben Pandeira, also known as Yeishu ha-Notzri. Talmudic
scholars have always maintained that the story of Jesus began with Yeishu.
The Hebrew name for Jesus has always been Yeishu and the Hebrew for "Jesus
the Nazarene" has always been "Yeishu ha-Notzri." (The name Yeishu is a
shortened form of the name Yeishua, not Yehoshua.) It is important to note
that Yeishu ha-Notzri is not an historical Jesus since modern Christianity
denies any connection between Jesus and Yeishu and moreover, parts of the
Jesus myth are based on other historical people besides Yeishu.

We know very little about Yeishu ha-Notzri. All modern works that mention
him are based on information taken from the Tosefta and the Baraitas -
writings made at the same time as the Mishna but not contained in it. Because
the historical information concerning Yeishu is so damaging to Christianity,
most Christian authors (and even some Jewish ones) have tried to discredit
this information and have invented many ingenious arguments to explain
it away. Many of their arguments are based on misunderstandings and misquotations
of the Baraitas and in order to get an accurate picture of Yeishu one should
ignore Christian authors and examine the Baraitas directly.

The skimpy information contained in the Baraitas is as follows: Rabbi
Yehoshua ben Perachyah once repelled Yeishu with both hands. People believed
that Yeishu was a sorcerer and they considered him to be a person who had
led the Jews astray. As a result of charges brought against him (the details
of which are not known, but which probably involved high treason) Yeishu
was stoned and his body hung up on the eve of Passover. Before this he
was paraded around for forty days with a herald going in front of him announcing
that he would be stoned and calling for people to come forward to plead
for him. Nothing was brought forward in his favor however. Yeishu had five
disciples: Mattai, Naqai, Neitzer, Buni, and Todah.

In the Tosefta and the Baraitas, Yeishu's father is named Pandeira or
Panteiri. These are Hebrew-Aramaic forms of a Greek name. In Hebrew the
third consonant of the name is written either with a dalet or a tet. Comparison
with other Greek words transliterated into Hebrew shows that the original
Greek must have had a delta as its third consonant and so the only possibility
for the father's Greek name is Panderos. Since Greek names were common
among Jews during Hashmonean times it is not necessary to assume that he
was Greek, as some authors have done.

The connection between Yeishu and Jesus is corroborated by the the fact
that Mattai and Todah, the names of two of Yeishu's disciples, are the
original Hebrew forms of Matthew and Thaddaeus, the names of two of Jesus's
disciples in Christian mythology.

The early Christians were also aware of the name "ben Pandeira" for
Jesus. The pagan philosopher Celsus, who was famous for his arguments against
Christianity, claimed in 178 C.E. that he had heard from a Jew that Jesus's
mother, Mary, had been divorced by her husband, a carpenter, after it had
been proved that she was an adultress. She wandered about in shame and
bore Jesus in secret. His real father was a soldier named Pantheras. According
to the Christian writer Epiphanius (c. 320 - 403 C.E.), the Christian apologist
Origen (c.185 – 254 C.E.) had claimed that "Panther" was the nickname for
Jacob the father of Joseph, the stepfather of Jesus. It should be noted
that Origen's claim is not based on any historical information. It is purely
a conjecture aimed at explaining away the Pantheras story of Celsus. That
story is also not historical. The claim that the name of Jesus's mother
was Mary and the claim that her husband was a carpenter is taken directly
from Christian belief. The claim that Jesus's real father was named Pantheras
is based on an incorrect attempt at reconstructing the original form of
Pandeira. This incorrect reconstruction was probably influenced by the
fact that the name Pantheras was found among Roman soldiers.

Why did people believe that Jesus's mother was named Mary and her husband
named Joseph? Why did non-Christians accuse Mary of being an adultress
while Christians believed she was a virgin? To answer these questions one
must examine some of the legends surrounding Yeishu. We cannot hope to
obtain the absolute truth concerning the origins of the Jesus myth but
we can show that reasonable alternatives exist to blindly accepting the
New Testament.

The name Joseph for Jesus's stepfather is easy to explain. The Notzri
movement was particularly popular with the Samaritan Jews. While the Pharisees
were waiting for a Messiah who would be a descendant of David, the Samaritans
wanted a Messiah who would restore the northern kingdom of Israel. The
Samaritans emphasized their partial descent from the tribes of Ephraim
and Manasseh, who were descended from the Joseph of the Torah. The Samaritans
considered themselves to be "Bnei Yoseph" i.e. "sons of Joseph," and since
they believed that Jesus had been their Messiah, they would have assumed
that he was a "son of Joseph." The Greek speaking population, who had little
knowledge of Hebrew and true Jewish traditions, could have easily misunderstood
this term and assumed that Joseph was the actual name of Jesus's father.
This conjecture is corroborated by the fact that according to the Gospel
of Matthew, Joseph's father is named Jacob, just like the Torah Joseph.
Later, other Christians, who followed the idea that the Messiah was to
be descended from David, tried to trace Joseph back to David. They came
up with two contradictory genealogies for him, one recorded in Matthew
and the other in Luke. When the idea that Mary was a virgin developed,
the mythical Joseph was relegated to the position of simply being her husband
and the stepfather of Jesus.

To understand where the Mary story came from we have to turn to another
historical character who contributed to the Jesus myth, namely ben Stada.
All the information we have on ben Stada again comes from the Tosefta and
the Baraitas. There is even less information about him than about Yeishu.
Some people believed that he had brought spells out of Egypt in a cut in
his flesh, others thought that he was a madman. He was a beguiler and was
caught by the method of concealed witnesses. He was stoned in Lod.

In the Tosefta, ben Stada is called ben Sotera or ben Sitera. Sotera
seems to be the Hebrew-Aramaic form of the Greek name Soteros. The forms
"Sitera" and "Stada" seem have arisen as misreadings and spelling mistakes
(yod replacing vav and dalet replacing reish).

Since there was so little information concerning ben Stada, many conjectures
arose as to who he was. It is known from the Gemara that he was confused
with Yeishu. This probably resulted from the fact that both were executed
for treasonous teachings and were associated with sorcery. People who confused
ben Stada with Yeishu had to explain why he was also called ben Pandeira.
Since the name "Stada" resembles the Aramaic expression "stat da," meaning
"she went astray" it was thought that "Stada" referred to the mother of
Yeishu and that she was an adultress. Consequently, people began to think
that Yeishu was the illegitimate son of Pandeira. These ideas are in fact
mentioned in the Gemara and are probably much older. Since ben Stada lived
in Roman times and the name Pandeira resembled the name Pantheras found
among Roman soldiers, it was assumed that Pandeira had been a Roman soldier
stationed in Israel. This certainly explains the story mentioned by Celsus.

The Tosefta mentions a famous case of a woman named Miriam bat Bilgah
marrying a Roman soldier. The idea that Yeishu had been born to a Jewish
woman who had had an affair with a Roman soldier probably resulted in Yeishu's
mother being confused with this Miriam. The name "Miriam" is of course
the original form of the name "Mary." It is in fact known from the Gemara
that some of the people who confused Yeishu with ben Stada believed that
Yeishu's mother was "Miriam the women's hairdresser."

The story that Mary (Miriam) the mother of Jesus was an adulteress was
certainly not acceptable to the early Christians. The virgin birth story
was probably invented to clear Mary's name. The early Christians did not
suck this story out of their thumbs. Virgin birth stories were fairly common
in pagan myths. The following mythological characters were all believed
to have been born to divinely impregnated virgins: Romulus and Remus, Perseus,
Zoroaster, Mithras, Osiris-Aion, Agdistis, Attis, Tammuz, Adonis, Korybas,
Dionysus. The pagan belief in unions between gods and women, regardless
of whether they were virgins or not, is even more common. Many characters
in pagan mythology were believed to be sons of divine fathers and human
females. The Christian belief that Jesus was the son of God born to a virgin,
is typical of Greco-Roman superstition. The Jewish philosopher, Philo of
Alexandria (c. 30 B.C.E - 45 C.E.), warned against the widespread superstitious
belief in unions between male gods and human females which returned women
to a state of virginity.

The god Tammuz, worshipped by pagans in northern Israel, was said to
have been born to the virgin Myrrha. The name "Myrrha" superficially resembles
"Mary/Miriam" and it is possible that this particular virgin birth story
influenced the Mary story more than the others. Like Jesus, Tammuz was
always called Adon, meaning "Lord." (The character Adonis in Greek mythology
is based on Tammuz.) As we will see later, the connection between Jesus
and Tammuz goes much further than this.

The idea that Mary had been an adultress never completely disappeared
in Christian mythology. Instead, the character of Mary was split into two:
Mary the mother of Jesus, believed to be a virgin, and Mary Magdalene,
believed to be a woman of ill repute. The idea that the character of Mary
Magdalene is also derived from Miriam the mythical mother of Yeishu, is
corroborated by the fact that the strange name "Magdalene" clearly resembles
the Aramaic term "mgadla nshaya," meaning "womens' hairdresser." As mentioned
before, there was a belief that Yeishu's mother was "Miriam the women's
hairdresser." Because the Christians did not know what the name "Magdalene"
meant, they later conjectured that it meant that she had come from a place
called Magdala on the west of Lake Kinneret. The idea of the two Marys
fitted in well with the pagan way of thinking. The image of Jesus being
followed by the two Marys is strongly reminiscent of Dionysus being followed
by Demeter and Persephone.

The Gemara contains an interesting legend concerning Yeishu which attempts
to elucidate the Beraita which says that Rabbi Yehoshua ben Perachyah repelled
Yeishu with both hands. The legend claims that when the Hashmonean king
Yannai was killing the Pharisees, Rabbi Yehoshua and Yeishu fled to Egypt.
When returning they came upon an inn. The Aramaic word "aksanya" means
both "inn" or "innkeeper." Rabbi Yehoshua remarked how beautiful the "aksanya"
was (meaning the inn). Yeishu (meaning the innkeeper) replied that her
eyes were too narrow. Rabbi Yehoshua was very angry with Yeishu and excommunicated
him. Yeishu asked many times for forgiveness but Rabbi Yehoshua would not
forgive him. Once when Rabbi Yehoshua was reciting the Shema, Yeishu came
up to him. He made a sign to him that he should wait. Yeishu misunderstood
and thought that he was being rejected again. He mocked Rabbi Yehoshua
by setting up a brick and worshipping it. Rabbi Yehoshua told him to repent
but he refused to, saying that he had learned from him that anyone who
sins and causes many to sin, is not given the opportunity to repent.

The above story, up to the events at the inn, closely resembles another
legend in which the protagonist is not Rabbi Yehoshua but his disciple
Yehuda ben Tabbai. In this legend, Yeishu is not named. One may thus question
whether Yeishu really went to Egypt or not. It is possible that Yeishu
was confused with some other disciple of either Rabbi Yehoshua or Rabbi
Yehuda. The confusion might have resulted from the fact that Yeishu was
confused with ben Stada who had returned from Egypt. On the other hand,
Yeishu might have really fled to Egypt and returned, and this in turn could
have contributed to the confusion between Yeishu and ben Stada. Whatever
the case, the belief that Yeishu fled to Egypt to escape being killed by
a cruel king, appears to be the origin of the Christian belief that Jesus
and his family fled to Egypt to escape King Herod.

Since the early Christians believed that Jesus had lived in Roman times
it is natural that they would have confused the evil king who wanted to
kill Jesus with Herod, since there were no other suitable evil kings during
the Roman period. Yeishu was an adult at the time that the rabbis fled
from Yannai; why did the Christians believe that Jesus and his family had
fled to Egypt when Jesus was an infant? Why did the Christians believe
that Herod had ordered all baby boys born in Bethlehem to be killed, when
there is no historical evidence of this? To answer these questions we again
have to look at pagan mythology.

The theme of a divine or semi-divine child who is feared by an evil
king is very common in pagan mythology. The usual story is that the evil
king receives a prophecy that a certain child will be born who will usurp
the throne. In some stories the child is born to a virgin and usually he
is son of a god. The mother of the child tries to hide him. The king usually
orders the slaying of all babies who might be the prophecied king. Examples
of myths which follow this plot are the birth stories of Romulus and Remus,
Perseus, Krishna, Zeus, and Oedipus. Although Torah literalists will not
like to admit it, the story of Moses's birth also resembles these myths
(some of which claim that the mother put the child in a basket and placed
him in a river). There were probably several such stories circulating in
the Levant which have been lost. The Christian myth of the slaughter of
the innocents by Herod is simply a Christain version of this theme. The
plot was so well known that one Midrashic scholar could not resist using
it for an apocryphal account of Abraham's birth.

The early Christians believed that the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem.
This belief is based on a misunderstanding of Micah 5.2 which simply
names Bethlehem as the town where the Davidic lineage began. Since the
early Christians believed that Jesus was the Messiah, they automatically
believed that he was born in Bethlehem. But why did the Christians believe
that he lived in Nazareth? The answer is quite simple. The early Greek
speaking Christians did not know what the word "Nazarene" meant. The earliest
Greek form of this word is "Nazoraios," which is derived from "Natzoriya,"
the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew "Notzri." (Recall that "Yeishu ha-Notzri"
is the original Hebrew for "Jesus the Nazarene.") The early Christians
conjectured that "Nazarene" meant a person from Nazareth and so it was
assumed that Jesus lived in Nazareth. Even today, Christians blithely confuse
the Hebrew words "Notzri" (Nazarene, Christian), "Natzrati"
(Nazarethite) and "nazir" (nazarite), all of which have completely
different meanings.

The information in the Talmud (which contains the Baraitas and the Gemara),
concerning Yeishu and ben Stada, is so damaging to Christianity that Christians
have always taken drastic measures against it. When the Christians first
discovered the information they immediately tried to wipe it out by censoring
the Talmud. The Basle edition of the Talmud (c. 1578 - 1580) had all the
passages relating to Yeishu and ben Stada deleted by the Christians. Even
today, editions of the Talmud used by Christian scholars lack these passages!

During the first few decades of this century, fierce academic battles
raged between atheist and Christian scholars over the true origins of Christianity.
The Christians were forced to face up to the Talmudic evidence. They could
no longer ignore it and so they decided to attack it instead. They claimed
that the Talmudic Yeishu was a distortion of the "historical Jesus." They
claimed that the name "Pandeira" was simply a Hebrew attempt at pronouncing
the Greek word for virgin--"parthenos." Although there is a superficial
resemblence between the words, one should note that in order for "Pandeira"
to be derived from "parthenos," the "n" and "r" have to be interchanged.
However, the Jews did not suffer from any speech impediment which would
cause this to happen! The Christian response is that possibly the Jews
purposefully altered the word "parthenos" to either the name "Pantheras"
(found in Celsus's story) or to "pantheros" meaning a panther, and "Pandeira"
is derived from the deliberately altered word. This argument also fails
since the third consonant of both the altered and unaltered "parthenos"
is theta. This letter is always transliterated by the Hebrew letter tav,
whose pronunciation during classical times most closely resembled that
of the Greek letter. However, the name "Pandeira" is never spelled with
a tav but with either a dalet or a tet which show that the original Greek
form had a delta as its third consonant, not a theta. The Christian argument
can also be turned on its head: maybe the Christians deliberately altered
"Pantheras" to "parthenos" when they invented the virgin birth story. It
should also be noted that the resemblence between "Pantheras" (or "pantheros")
and "parthenos" is actually much less when written in Greek since in the
original Greek spelling their second vowels are completely different.

The Christians also did not accept that Mary Magdalene was connected
to Miriam the alleged mother of Yeishu in the Talmud. They argued that
the name "Magdalene" does mean a person from Magdala and that the Jews
invented "Miriam the women’s hairdresser mgadla nshaya)" either
to mock the Christians, or out of their own misunderstanding of the name
"Magdalene." This argument is also false. Firstly, it ignores Greek grammar:
the correct Greek for "of Magdala" is "Magdales" and the correct Greek
for a person from Magdala is "Magdalaios." The original Greek root of "Magdalene"
is "Magdalen-," with a conspicuous "n" showing that the word has nothing
to do with Magdala. Secondly, Magdala only got its name after the Gospels
were written. Before that it was called Magadan or Dalmanutha. (Although
"Magadan" has an "n," it lacks an "l" and so it cannot be the derivation
of "Magdalene.") In fact, the ruins of this area were renamed Magdala by
the Christian community because they believed that Mary Magdalene had come
from there.

The Christians also claimed that the word "Notzri" means a person from
Nazareth. This is of course false since the original Hebrew for Nazareth
is "Natzrat" and a person from Nazareth is a "Natzrati." The name "Notzri"
lacks the letter tav from "Natzrat" as so it cannot be derived from it.
The Christians argue that perhaps the Aramaic name for Nazareth was "Natzarah"
or "Natzirah" (like the modern Arabic name) which explains the missing
tav in "Notzri." This is also nonsense since the Aramaic word for a person
from Nazareth would then be "Natzaratiya" or "Natziratiya" (with a tav
since the feminine ending "-ah" would become "-at-" when the suffix "-iya"
is added), and besides, the Aramaic form would not be used in Hebrew. The
Christians also came up with various other arguments which can be dismissed
since they confuse the Hebrew words "Notzri" and "nazir" or ignore the
fact that "Notzri" is the earliest form of the word "Nazarene."

To sum up, all the Christian arguments were based on impossible phonetic
changes and grammatical forms, and were consequently dismissed. Moreover,
although the legends in the Gemara cannot be taken as fact, the evidence
in the Baraitas and Tosefta concerning Yeishu can be traced back directly
to Yehoshua ben Perachyah, Shimon ben Shetach and Yehuda ben Tabbai and
their disciples who were contemporaries of Yeishu, while the evidence in
the Baraitas and Tosefta concerning ben Stada can be traced to Rabbi Eliezer
ben Hyrcanus and his disciples who were ben Stada's contempories. Consequently
the evidence can be regarded as historically accurate. Therefore modern
Christians no longer attack the Talmud but instead deny any connection
between Jesus and Yeishu or ben Stada. They dismiss the similarities as
pure coincidence. However, one must still be aware of the false attacks
on the Talmud since many Christian books still mention them and they can
and do resurface from time to time.

Many parts of the Jesus story are not based on Yeishu or ben Stada.
Most Christian denominations claim that Jesus was born on 25 December.
Originally the eastern Christains believed that he was born on 6 January.
The Armenian Christians still follow this early belief while most Christians
consider it to be the date of the visit of the Magi. As pointed out already,
Jesus was probably confused with Tammuz born of the virgin Myrrha. We know
that in Roman times, the gods Tammuz, Aion and Osiris were identified.
Osiris-Aion was said to be born of the virgin Isis on the 6 January and
this explains the earlier date for Christmas. Isis was sometimes represented
as a sacred cow and her temple as a stable which is probably the origin
of the Christian belief that Jesus was born in a stable. Although some
might find this claim to be farfetched, it is known as a fact that certain
early Christian sects identified Jesus and Osiris in their writings. The
date of 25 December for Christmas was originally the pagan birthday of
the sun god, whose day of the week is still known as Sunday.
The halo of light which is usually shown surrounding the face of Jesus
and Christian saints, is another concept taken from the sun god.

The theme of temptation by a devil-like creature was also found in pagan
mythology. In particular the story of Jesus's temptation by Satan resembles
the temptation of Osiris by the devil-god Set in Egyptian mythology.

We have already hinted that there was also a connection between Jesus
and the pagan god Dionysus. Like Dionysus, the infant Jesus was wrapped
in swaddling clothes and placed in a manger; like Dionysus, Jesus could
turn water into wine; like Dionysus, Jesus rode on an ass and fed a multitude
in the wilderness; like Dionysus, Jesus suffered and was mocked. Some early
Christians claimed that Jesus had in fact been born, not in a stable, but
in a cave--just like Dionysus.

Where did the story that Jesus was crucified come from? It appears to
have resulted from a number of sources. Firstly there were three historical
characters during the Roman period who people thought were Messiahs and
who were crucified by the Romans, namely Yehuda of Galilee (6 C.E.), Theudas
(44 C.E.), and Benjamin the Egyptian (60 C.E.). Since these three people
were all thought to be the Messiah, they were naturally confused with Yeishu
and ben Stada. Yehuda of Galilee had preached in Galilee and had collected
many followers before being crucified by the Romans. The story of Jesus's
ministry in Galilee appears to be based on the life of Yehuda of Galilee.
This story and the belief that Jesus lived in Nazareth in Galilee, reinforced
each other. The belief that some of Jesus's disciples were killed in c.
44 C.E. by Agrippa appears to be based the fate of Theudas's disciples.
Since ben Stada had come from Egypt it is natural that he would have been
confused with Benjamin the Egyptian. They were probably also contemporaries.
Even some modern authors have suggested that they were the same person,
although this is not possible since the stories of their deaths are completely
different. In the New Testament book of Acts, which uses Josephus's
book Jewish Antiquities (93 - 94 C.E.) as a reference, it is made
clear that the author considered Jesus, Yehuda of Galilee, Theudas and
Benjamin the Egyptian, to be four different people. However, by that time
it was too late to undo the confusions which had already taken place before
the New Testament was written, and the idea of Jesus's crucifixion had
become an integral part of the myth.

Secondly, the idea arose that Jesus had been executed on the eve of
Passover. This belief is apparently based on Yeishu's execution. Passover
occurs at the time of the Vernal Equinox, an event considered important
by astrologers during the Roman Empire. The astrologers thought of this
time as the time of the crossing of two astrological celestial circles,
and this event was symbolized by a cross. Thus there was a belief that
Jesus had died on "the cross." The misunderstanding of this term by those
who were not initiated into the astrological cults, was another factor
contributing to the belief that Jesus was crucified. In one of the earliest
Christian documents (the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles) there
is no mention of Jesus being crucified yet the sign of a cross in the sky
is used to represent Jesus's coming. It should be noted that the center
of astrological superstition in the Roman Empire was the city of Tarsus
in Asia Minor - the place where the legendary missionary Paul came from.
The idea that a special star had heralded the birth of Jesus, and that
a solar eclipse occurred at his death, is typical of Tarsian astrological
superstition.

The third factor contributing to the crucifixion story is again pagan
mythology. The theme of a divine or semi-divine being sacrificed against
a tree, pole or cross, and then being resurrected, is very common in pagan
mythology. It was found in the mythologies of all western civilizations
stretching from as far west as Ireland and as far east as India. In particular
it is found in the mythologies of Osiris and Attis, both of whom were often
identified with Tammuz. Osiris landed up with his arms stretched out on
a tree like Jesus on the cross. This tree was sometimes shown as a pole
with outstretched arms - the same shape as the Christian cross. In the
worship of Serapis (a composite of Osiris and Apis) the cross was a religious
symbol. Indeed, the Christian "Latin cross" symbol seems to be based directly
on the cross symbol of Osiris and Serapis. The Romans never used this traditional
Christian cross for crucifixions, they used crosses shaped either like
an X or a T. The hieroglyph of a cross on a hill was associated with Osiris.
This heiroglyph stood for the "Good One," in Greek "Chrestos," a name applied
to Osiris and other pagan gods. The confusion of this name with "Christos"
(Messiah, Christ) strengthened the confusion between Jesus and the pagan
gods.

At the Vernal Equinox, pagans in northern Israel would celebrate the
death and resurrection of the virgin-born Tammuz-Osiris. In Asia Minor
(where the earliest Christian churches were established) a similar celebration
was held for the virgin-born Attis. Attis was shown as dying against a
tree, being buried in a cave and then being resurrected on the third day.
We thus see where the Christian story of Jesus's resurrection comes from.
In the worship of Baal, it was believed that Baal cheated Mavet (the god
of death) at the time of the Vernal Equinox. He pretended to be dead but
later appeared alive. He accomplished this ruse by giving his only son
as a sacrifice.

The occurrence of Passover at the same time of year as the pagan "Easter"
festivals is not coincidental. Many of the Pessach customs were designed
as Jewish alternatives to pagan customs. The pagans believed that when
their nature god (such as Tammuz, Osiris or Attis) died and was resurrected,
his life went into the plants used by man as food. The matza made from
the spring harvest was his new body and the wine from the grapes was his
new blood. In Judaism, matza, was not used to represent the body of a god
but the poor man's bread which the Jews ate before leaving Egypt. The pagans
used the paschal sacrifice to represent the sacrifice of a god or his only
son, but Judaism used it to represent the meal eaten before leaving Egypt.
Instead of telling stories about Baal sacrificing his first born son to
Mavet, the Jews told how mal'ach ha-mavet (the angel of death) slew
the first born sons of the Egyptians. The pagans ate eggs to represent
the resurrection and rebirth of their nature god, but the egg on the seder
plate represents the rebirth of the Jewish people escaping captivity in
Egypt. When the early Christians noticed the similarities between Pessach
customs and pagan customs, they came full circle and converted the Pessach
customs back to their old pagan interpretations. The seder became the last
supper of Jesus, similar to the last supper of Osiris commemorated at the
Vernal Equinox. The matza and wine once again became the body and blood
of a false god, this time Jesus. Easter eggs are again eaten to commemorate
the resurrection of a "god" and also the "rebirth" obtained by accepting
his sacrifice on the cross.

The Last Supper myth is particularly interesting. As mentioned, the
basic idea of last supper occurring at the Vernal Equinox comes from the
story of the last supper of Osiris. In the Christian story, Jesus is present
with twelve apostles. Where did the story of the twelve apostles come from?
It appears that in its earliest version, the story was understood to be
an allegory. The first time that twelve apostles are mentioned is in the
document known as the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. This document
apparently originated as a sectarian Jewish document written in the first
century C.E., but it was adopted by Christians who altered it substantially
and added Christian ideas to it. In the earliest versions it is clear that
the "twelve apostles" are the twelve sons of Jacob representing the twelve
tribes of Israel. The Christians later considered the "twelve apostles"
to be allegorical disciples of Jesus.

In Egyptian mythology, Osiris was betrayed at his last supper by the
evil god Set, whom the Greeks identified with Typhon. This seems to be
the origin of the idea that Jesus's betrayer was present at his last supper.
The idea that this betrayer was named "Judas" goes back to the time when
the twelve apostles were still understood to be the sons of Jacob. The
idea of Judas (Judah, Yehuda) betraying Jesus (the "son" of Joseph) is
strongly reminiscent of the story of the Torah Joseph being betrayed by
his brothers with Yehuda as the ringleader. This allegory would have been
particulary appealing to the Samaritan Notzrim who considered themselves
to be sons of Joseph betrayed by mainstream Jews (represented by Judas/Yehuda).

However, the story of the twelve apostles lost its original allegorical
interpretation and the Christians began to think that the "twelve apostles"
were twelve real people who followed Jesus. The Christians attempted to
find names for these twelve apostles. Matthew and Thaddaeus were based
on Mattai and Todah, two of Yeishu's disciples. One or both of the apostles
named Jacobus (James) is possibly based on Jacob of Kfar Sekanya, an early
Christian known to Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus, but this is just a guess.
As we have seen, the character of Judas is mostly based on the Judah of
the Torah but there might also be a connection with Yeishu's contemporary,
Yehuda ben Tabbai the disciple of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Perachyah. As already
mentioned, the idea of the betrayer at the last supper is derived from
the mythology of Osiris who was betrayed by Set-Typhon. Set-Typhon had
red hair and this is probably the origin of the claim that Judas had red
hair. This idea has led to the Christian stereotypical portrayal of Jews
as having red hair, despite the fact that in reality, red hair is far more
common among Aryans than among Jews.

Judas is often given the nickname "Iscariot." In some places where English
New Testaments have "Iscariot," the Greek text actually has "apo Kariotou"
which means "from Karyot." Karyot was the name of a town in Israel, probably
the modern site known in Arabic as Karyatein. We thus see that the name
Iscariot is derived from the Hebrew "ish Karyot" meaning "man from Karyot."
This is in fact the accepted modern Christian understanding of the name.
However, in the past, the Christians misunderstood this name and legends
arose that Judas was from the town of Sychar, that he was a member
of the extremist party known as the Sicarii and that he was from
the tribe of Issacher. The most interesting misunderstanding of
the name is its early confusion with the word scortea meaning a
leather money bag. This led to the New Testament myth that Judas carried
such a bag, which in turn led to the belief that he was the treasurer of
the apostles.

The apostle Peter appears to be a largely fictitious character. According
to Christian mythology, Jesus chose him to be the "keeper of the keys to
the kingdom of heaven." This is clearly based on the Egyptian pagan deity,
Petra, who was the door-keeper of heaven and the afterlife ruled over by
Osiris. We must also doubt the story of Luke "the good healer" who was
supposed to be a friend of Paul. The original Greek for "Luke" is "Lykos"
which was another name for Apollo, the god of healing.

John the Baptist is largely based on an historical person who practiced
ritual immersion in water as a physical symbol for repentance. He did not
perform Christian style sacramental baptisms to cleanse people's souls
- such an idea was totally foreign to Judaism. He was put to death by Herod
Antipas, who feared that he was about to start a rebellion. John's name
in Greek was "Ioannes" and in Latin "Johannes." Although these names were
usually used for the Hebrew name Yochanan, it is unlikely that this was
John's actual Hebrew name. "Ioannes" closely resembles "Oannes" the Greek
name for the pagan god Ea. Oannes was the "God of the House of Water."
Sacramental baptism for magically cleansing souls was a practice which
apparently originated in the worship of Oannes. The most likely explanation
of John's name and its connection with Oannes is that John probably bore
the nickname "Oannes" since he practised baptism which he had adapted from
the worship of Oannes. The name "Oannes" was later confused with "Ioannes."
(In fact, the New Testament legend concerning John provides a clue that
his real name might have been Zacharia.) It is known from Josephus's writings
that the historical John rejected the pagan "soul-cleansing" interpretation
of baptism. The Christians, however, returned to this original pagan interpretation.

The god Oannes was associated with the constellation Capricorn. Both
Oannes and the constellation Capricorn were associated with water. (The
constellation is supposed to depict a mythical sea-creature with the body
of a fish and the foreparts of a goat.) We have already seen that Jesus
was given the same birthday as the sun god (25 December), when the sun
is in the constellation of Capricorn. The pagans thought of this period
as one where the sun god is immersed in the waters of Oannes and emerges
reborn. (The Winter Solstice, when days start getting longer, occurs near
25 December.) This astrological myth is apparently the origin of the story
that Jesus was baptized by John. It probably started as an allegorical
astrological story, but it appears that the god Oannes later became confused
with the historical person nicknamed Oannes (John).

The belief that Jesus had met John contributed to the belief that Jesus's
ministry and crucifixion occurred when Pontius Pilate was procurator of
Judaea. It should be noted that most dates for Jesus quoted by Christians
are completely nonsense. Jesus was partly based on Yeishu and ben Stada
who probably lived more than a century apart. He was also based on the
three false Messiahs, Yehuda, Theudas and Benjamin, who were crucified
by the Romans at various different times. Another fact that contributed
to confused dating of Jesus was that Jacob of Kfar Sekanya and probably
other Notzrim as well, used expressions like "thus was I taught by Yeishu
ha-Notzri," even though he had not been taught by Yeishu in person. We
know from the Gemara that Jacob's statement led Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus
to incorrectly conclude that Jacob was a disciple of Yeishu. This suggests
that there were rabbis who were unaware of the fact that Yeishu had lived
in Hashmonean times. Even after Christians placed Jesus in the first century
C.E., confusion continued among non-Christians. There was a contemporary
of Rabbi Akiva named Pappus ben Yehuda who used to lock up his unfaithful
wife. We know from the Gemara that some people who confused Yeishu and
ben Stada confused the wife of Pappus with Miriam the unfaithful mother
of Yeishu. This would place Yeishu more than two centuries after he actually
lived!

The New Testament story confuses so many historical periods that there
is no way of reconciling it with history. The traditional year of Jesus's
birth is 1 C.E. Jesus was supposed to be not more than two years old when
Herod ordered the slaughter of the innocents. However, Herod died before
April 12, 4 B.C.E. This has led some Christians to redate the birth of
Jesus in 6 - 4 B.C.E. However, Jesus was also supposed have been born during
the census of Quirinius. This census took place after Archelaus was deposed
in 6 C.E., ten years after Herod's death. Jesus was supposed to have been
baptized by John soon after John had started baptizing and preaching in
the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberias, i.e. 28-29 C.E., when Pontius
Pilate was governor of Judaea i.e. 26-36 C.E. According to the New Testament,
this also happened when Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene and Annas and
Caiaphas were high priests. But Lysanias ruled Abilene from c. 40 B.C.E
until he was executed in 36 B.C.E by Mark Antony, about 60 years before
the date for Tiberias and about 30 years before the supposed birth of Jesus!
Also, there were never two joint high priests, in particular, Annas was
not a joint high priest with Caiaphas. Annas was removed from the office
of high priest in 15 C.E after holding office for some nine years. Caiaphas
only became high priest in c. 18 C.E, about three years after Annas. (He
held this office for about eighteen years, so his dates are consistent
with Tiberias and Pontius Pilate, but not with Annas or Lysanias.) Although
the book of Acts presents Yehuda of Galilee, Theudas and Jesus as
three different people, it incorrectly places Theudas (crucified 44 C.E.)
before Yehuda who it correctly mentions as being crucified during the census
(6 C.E.). Many of these chronological absurdities seem to be based on misreadings
and misunderstandings of Josephus's book Jewish Antiquities, which
was used as reference by the author of Luke and Acts.

The story of Jesus's trial is also highly suspicious. It clearly tries
to placate the Romans while defaming the Jews. The historical Pontius Pilate
was arrogant and despotic. He hated the Jews and never delegated any authority
to them. However, in Christian mythology, he is portrayed as a concerned
ruler who distanced himself from the accusations against Jesus and who
was coerced into obeying the demands of the Jews. According to Christian
mythology, every Passover, the Jews would ask Pilate to free any one criminal
they chose. This is of course a blatant lie. Jews never had a custom of
freeing guilty criminals at Passover or any other time of the year. According
the myth, Pilate gave the Jews the choice of freeing Jesus the Christ or
a murderer named Jesus Barabbas. The Jews are alleged to have enthusiastically
chosen Jesus Barabbas. This story is a vicious antisemitic lie, one of
many such lies found in the New Testament (largely written by antisemites).
What is particularly disgusting about this rubbish story is that it is
apparently a distortion of an earlier story which claimed that the Jews
demanded that Jesus Christ be set free. The name "Barabbas" is simply the
Greek form of the Aramaic "bar Abba" which means "son of the Father." Thus
"Jesus Barabbas" originally meant "Jesus the son of the Father," in other
words, the usual Christian Jesus. When the earlier story claimed that the
Jews wanted Jesus Barabbas to be set free it was referring to the usual
Jesus. Somebody distorted the story by claiming that Jesus Barabbas was
a different person to Jesus Christ and this fooled the Roman and Greek
Christians who did not know the meaning of the name "Barabbas."

Lastly, the claim that the resurrected Jesus appeared to his disciples
is also based on pagan superstition. In Roman mythology, the virgin born
Romulus appeared to his friend on the road before he was taken up to heaven.
(The theme of being taken up to heaven is found in scores of pagan myths
and legends and even in Jewish stories.) It was claimed that Apollonius
of Tyana had also appeared to his disciples after having been resurrected.
It is interesting to note that the historical Apollonius was born more
or less at the same time as the mythical Jesus was supposed to have been
born. In legends people claimed that he had performed many miracles which
were identical to those also ascribed to Jesus, such as exorcisms of demons
and the raising to life of a dead girl.

When confronted with Christian missionaries one should point out as
much information as possible about the origins of Christianity and the
Jesus myth. You will almost never succeed in convincing them that Christianity
is a false religion. You will not be able to prove beyond all doubt that
the story of Jesus arose in the way we have claimed it has, since most
of the evidence is circumstantial. Indeed we cannot be certain about the
precise origin of many particular points in the story of Jesus. This does
not matter. What is important is that you yourself realize that logical
alternatives exist to blind belief in Christian myths and that reasonable
doubt can be cast on the New Testament narrative.

PART 2: THE LACK OF HISTORICAL EVIDENCE FOR JESUS

The usual Christian response to those who question the historicity of
Jesus is to palm off various documents as "historical evidence" for the
existence of Jesus. They usually start with the canonical gospels of Matthew,
Mark, Luke and John. The usual claim is that these
are "eyewitness accounts of the life of Jesus made by his disciples." The
reply to this argument can be summed up in one word--pseudepigraphic.
This term refers to works of writing whose authors conceal their true identities
behind the names of legendary characters from the past. Pseudepigraphic
writing was particularly popular among the Jews during Hashmonean and Roman
periods and this style of writing was adopted by the early Christians.

The canonical gospels are not the only gospels. For example, there are
also gospels of Mary, Peter, Thomas and Philip.
These four gospels are recognized as being pseudepigraphic by both Christian
and non-Christian scholars. They provide no legitimate historical information
since they were based on rumors and belief. The existence of these obviously
pseudepigraphic gospels makes it quite reasonable to suspect that the canonical
gospels might also be pseudepigraphic. The very fact that early Christians
wrote pseudepigraphic gospels suggests that this was in fact the norm.
It is thus the missionaries' claim that the canonical gospels are not
pseudepigraphic which requires proof.

The Gospel of Mark is written in the name of Mark, the disciple
of the mythical Peter. (Peter is largely based on the pagan god Petra,
who was door-keeper of heaven and the afterlife in Egyptian religion.)
Even in Christian mythology, Mark was not a disciple of Jesus, but a friend
of Paul and Luke. Mark was written before Matthew and Luke
(c. 100 C.E.) but after the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E., which
it mentions. Most Christians believe it was written in c. 75 C.E. This
date is not based on history but on the belief that an historical Mark
wrote the gospel in his old age. This is not possible since the style of
language used in Mark shows that it was written (probably in Rome)
by a Roman convert to Christianity whose first language was Latin and not
Greek, Hebrew or Aramaic. Indeed, since all the other gospels are written
in the name of legendary characters from the past, Mark was probably
written long after any historical Mark (if there was one) had died. The
content of Mark is a collection of myths and legends put together
to form a continuous narrative. There is no evidence that it was based
on any reliable historical sources. Mark was altered and edited
many times and the modern version probably dates to about 150 C.E. Clement
of Alexandria (c. 150 C.E. - c. 215 C.E.) complained about the alternative
versions of this gospel which were still circulating in his lifetime. (The
Carpocratians, an early Christian sect, considered pederasty to be a virtue
and Clement complained about their versions of Mark which told of
Jesus's homosexual exploits with young boys!)

The Gospel of Matthew was certainly not written by the apostle
Matthew. The character of Matthew is based on the historical person named
Mattai who was a disciple of Yeishu ben Pandeira. (Yeishu, who lived in
Hashmonean times, was one of several historical people upon whom the character
Jesus is based.) The Gospel of Matthew was originally anonymous
and was only assigned the name Matthew some time during the first
half of the second century C.E. The earliest form was probably written
at more or less the same time as the Gospel of Luke (c. 100 C.E.),
since neither seems to know of the other. It was altered and edited until
about 150 C.E. The first two chapters, dealing with the virgin birth, were
not in the original version and the Christians in Israel of Jewish descent
preferred this earlier version. For its sources it used Mark and
a collection of teachings referred to as the Second Source (or the
Q Document). The Second Source has not survived as a separate
document, but its full contents are found in Matthew and Luke.
All the teachings contained in it can be found in Judaism. The more reasonable
teachings can be found in mainstream Judaism, while the less reasonable
ones can be found in sectarian Judaism. There is nothing in it which would
require us to suppose the existence of a real historical Jesus. Although
Matthew and Luke attribute the teachings in it to Jesus,
the Epistle of James attributes them to James. Thus Matthew
provides no historical evidence for Jesus.

The Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts (which were two
parts of a single work) were written in the name of the Christian mythological
character Luke the healer (who was probably not an historical person but
a Christian adaptation of the Greek healer god Lykos). Even in Christian
mythology, Luke was not a disciple of Jesus but a friend of Paul. Luke
and Acts use Josephus's Jewish Antiquities as a reference,
and so they could not have been written before 93 C.E. At this time, any
friend of Paul would be either dead or well into senility. Indeed, both
Christian and non-Christian scholars agree that the earliest versions of
the two books were written by an anonymous Christian in c. 100 C.E and
were altered and edited until c. 150 - 175 C.E. Besides Josephus's book,
Luke and Acts also use the Gospel of Mark and the
Second Source as references. Although Josephus is considered to
be more or less reliable, the anonymous author often misread and misunderstood
Josephus and moreover, none of the information about Jesus in Luke
and Acts comes from Josephus. Thus Luke and Acts are
of no historical value.

The Gospel of John was written in the name of the apostle John
the brother of James, son of Zebedee. The author of Luke used as many sources
as he could get hold of but he was unaware of John. Thus John
more than likely could not have been written before Luke (c. 100
C.E.) Consequently John could not have been written by the semi-mythical
character John the Apostle who was supposed to have been killed by Herod
Agrippa shortly before his own death in 44 C.E. (John the Apostle is apparently
based on an historical disciple of the false Messiah Theudas who was crucified
by the Romans in 44 C.E. and whose disciples were murdered.) The real author
of the Gospel of John was in fact an anonymous Christian from Ephesus
in Asia Minor. The oldest surviving fragment of John dates to c.
125 C.E. and so we can date the gospel to c. 100 - 125 C.E. Based on stylistic
considerations many scholars narrow down the date to c. 110 - 120 C.E.
The earliest version of John did not contain the last chapter which
deals with Jesus appearing to his disciples. Like the other gospels, John
probably only attained its present form around 150 - 175 C.E. The author
of John used Mark sparingly and so one suspects that he did
not trust it. He either had not read Matthew and Luke or
he did not trust them since he does not use any information from them which
was not found in Mark. Most of John consists of legends with
obvious underlying allegorical interpretations and one suspects that the
author never intended them to be history. John does not contain
any information from reliable historical sources.

Christians will claim that the Gospel of John itself states that
it is an historical document written by John. This claim is based on the
verses John 19.34-35 and John 21.20 - 24. John 19.34-35
does not claim that the gospel was written by John. It claims that the
events described in the immediately preceding verses were accurately reported
by a witness. The passage is ambiguous and it is not clear whether the
witness is supposed to be the same person as the author. Many scholars
are of the opinion that the ambiguity is deliberate and that the author
of John is trying to tease his readers in this passage as well as
in the passages which tell miraculous stories with allegorical interpretations.
John 21.20-24 also does not claim that the author is John. It claims
that the disciple mentioned in the passage is the one who witnessed the
events described. It is again notably ambiguous as regards the question
of whether the disciple is the same person as the author. It should be
noted that this passage is in the last chapter of John which was
not part of the original gospel but was added on as an epilogue by an anonymous
redactor. One should beware the fact that many "easy to understand" translations
of the New Testament distort the passages mentioned so as to remove the
ambiguity found in the original Greek. (Ideally one needs to be familiar
with the original Greek text of the New Testament in order to avoid biased
and distorted translations used by fundamentalist Christians and missionaries.)

In order to back up their claims that the gospels of Mark and
Matthew were written by the "real" apostles Mark and Matthew and
that Jesus is an historical person, missionaries often point to the so-called
"testimony of Papias." Papias was the bishop of Hierapolis (near Ephesus)
during the middle of the second century C.E. None of his writings have
survived but the Christian historian Eusebius (c. 260 - 339 C.E.) in his
book, Ecclesiastical History (written c. 311 - 324 C.E.) paraphrased
certain passages from Papias's book Exposition of the Oracles of the
Lord (written c. 140 - 160 C.E.). In these passages, Papias claimed
that he had known the daughters of the apostle Philip and also reported
several stories which he claimed came from people named Aristion and John
the Elder, who had still been alive during his own lifetime. Eusebius appears
to have thought that Aristion and John the Elder were disciples of Jesus.
Papias claimed that John the Elder had said that Mark had been Peter's
interpreter and had written down accurately everything that Peter had to
tell about Jesus. Papias also claimed that Matthew had compiled all the
"oracles" in Hebrew and everyone had interpreted them as best they could.
None of this, however, provides any legitimate historical evidence of Jesus
nor does it back up the belief that Mark and Matthew were
really written by apostles bearing those names. Papias was a name-dropper
and it is by no means certain that he was honest when he claimed that he
had met Philip's daughters. Even if he had, this would at most prove that
the apostle Philip in Christian mythology was based on an historical person.
Papias never explicitly claimed that he had met Aristion and John the Elder.
Moreover, just because Eusebius in the 4th century believed that they were
disciples of Jesus does not mean that they were. Nothing at all is known
about who on earth Aristion actually was. He is certainly not one of the
disciples in the usual Christian tradition. I have seen books in which
certain fundamentalist Christians claim that John the Elder was the apostle
John the son of Zebedee and that he was still alive when Papias was young.
They also claim that Papias lived in c. 60 - 130 C.E. and that he wrote
his book in c. 120 C.E. These dates are not based on any legitimate evidence
and are complete nonsense: Papias was bishop of Hierapolis in c. 150 C.E
and as already mentioned his book was written sometime in the period c.
140 - 160 C.E. Pushing the date for Papias back to 60 C.E. still does not
place him during the lifetime of the apostle John who according to standard
Christian legends was killed in 44 C.E. Besides, it is unlikely that John
the Elder had anything to do with John the Apostle. According to Epiphanius
(c. 320 - 403 C.E.), an early Christian named John the Elder had died in
117 C.E. We will have more to say about him when we discuss the three epistles
named after John. Whatever the case, the stories which Papias collected
were being told at least a decade after the gospels and Acts had
been written and reflect unfounded rumors and superstition about the origins
of these books. In particular, the story about Mark obtained from John
the Elder is nothing more than a slight elaboration of the legend about
Mark found in Acts and so it tells us nothing about the true origins
of the Gospel of Mark. The story about Matthew writing the "oracles"
is simply a rumor, and besides, it does not have anything to do with the
Gospel of Matthew. The term "oracles" can only be understood as
a reference to the collection of writings known as the Oracles of the
Lord which is referred to in the title of Papias's book and which in
all likelyhood is the same thing as the Second Source, not the Gospel
of Matthew.

Besides the canonical gospels and Acts, missionaries also try
to use the various Christian epistles as proof of the Jesus story. They
claim that the epistles are letters written by Jesus's disciples and followers.
However, epistles (from the Greek epistol q e, meaning message or
order) are books, written in the form of letters (usually from legendary
characters from the past), which expound religious doctrines and instructions.
This form of religious writing was used by the Jews in Greco-Roman times.
(The most famous Jewish epistle is the Epistle of Jeremiah, which
is a lengthy condemnation of idolatry written during the Hellenistic period
in the form of a letter from the prophet Jeremiah to the people of Jerusalem
just before they were exiled to Babylon.) As in the case of the gospels,
there are Christian epistles not contained in the New Testament which both
Christian and non-Christian scholars agree are pseudepigraphic and of no
historical value since they expound beliefs and not history. The existence
of pseudepigraphic epistles and indeed the whole concept of an epistle,
suggests that epistles were normally pseudepigraphic. Thus again it is
the claims by missionaries and Christian fundamentalists, that the canonical
epistles are genuine letters, which requires proof.

The Epistle of Jude is written in the name of Jude (Judas) the
brother of James. According to Mark and Matthew, Jesus had
brothers named Judas and James. Comparison with other writings shows that
the Epistle of Jude was written in c. 130 C.E. and so it is obviously
pseudepigraphic. There is no evidence however that its author used any
legitimate historical sources as regards Jesus.

Two of the canonical epistles are written in the name of Peter. Since
Peter is a mythical Christian adaptation of the Egyptian pagan deity Petra,
these epistles were certainly not written by him. The style and character
of the First Epistle of Peter alone shows that it could not have
been written earlier than c. 80 C.E. Even according to Christian legend,
Peter was supposed to have died following the persecutions instigated by
Nero in c. 64 C.E. and so he could not have written the epistle. The author
of Luke and Acts used all written sources he could get hold
of and tended to use them indiscriminately, however he did not mention
any epistles by Peter. This shows that the First Epistle of Peter
was probably written after Luke and Acts (c. 100 C.E.). No
references to Jesus in the First Epistle of Peter are taken from
historical sources but instead reflect beliefs and superstition. The Second
Epistle of Peter speaks out against the Marcionists and so it must
have been written c. 150 C.E. It is thus clearly pseudepigraphic. The Second
Epistle of Peter uses as sources: the story of Jesus's transfiguration
found in Mark, Matthew and Luke, the Apocalypse
of Peter and the Epistle of Jude. The non-canonical Apocalypse
of Peter (written some time in the first quarter of the second century
C.E.) is recognized as being non-historical even by fundamentalist Christians.
Thus the Second Epistle of Peter also does not use any legitimate
historical sources.

We now turn to the epistles supposedly written by Paul. The First
Epistle of Paul to Timothy warns against the Marcionist work known
as the Antithesis. Marcion was expelled from the Church of Rome
in c. 144 C.E. and the First Epistle of Paul to Timothy was written
shortly afterwards. Thus we again have a clear case of pseudepigraphy.
The Second Epistle of Paul to Timothy and the Epistle of Paul
to Titus were written by the same author and date to about the same
period. These three epistles are known as the "pastoral epistles." The
ten remaining "non-pastoral" epistles written in the name of Paul were
known to Marcion by c. 140 C.E. Some of them were not written in Paul's
name alone but are in the form of letters written by Paul in collaboration
with various friends such as Sosthenes, Timothy, and Silas. The author
of Luke and Acts, went out of his way to obtain all sources
available and tended to use them indiscriminately, but he used nothing
from the Pauline epistles. We can thus conclude that the non-pastoral epistles
were written after Luke and Acts in the period c. 100 - 140
C.E. The non-canonical First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians
(written c. 125 C.E.) uses the First Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians
as a source and so we can narrow down the date for that epistle to c. 100
- 125 C.E. However, we are left with the conclusion that that all the Pauline
epistles are pseudepigraphic. (The semi-mythical Paul was supposed to have
died during the persecutions instigated by Nero in c. 64 C.E.) Some of
the Pauline epistles appear to be have been altered and edited numerous
times before reaching their modern forms. As sources they use each other,
Acts, the gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke
and the First Epistle of Peter. We may thus conclude that they provide
no historical evidence of Jesus.

The Epistle to the Hebrews is a particularly interesting epistle
since it is not pseudepigraphic but completely anonymous. Its author neither
reveals his own name nor does he write in the name of a Christian mythological
character. Fundamentalist Christians claim that it is another epistle by
Paul and in fact call it the Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews. This
idea, apparently dating to the late fourth century C.E., is not accepted
by all Christians however. As a source for its information on Jesus it
uses material common to Mark, Matthew and Luke, but
no legitimate sources. The author of the First Epistle of Clement used
it as a source and so it must have been written before that epistle (c.
125 C.E.) but after at least the Gospel of Mark (c. 75 – 100 C.E.).

The Epistle of James is written in the name of a servant of Jesus
called James (or Jacobus). However, in Christian mythology there were two
apostles named James and Jesus also had a brother named James. It is not
clear which James is intended and there is no agreement among Christians
themselves. It quotes sayings from the Second Source but unlike
Matthew and Luke it does not attribute these sayings to Jesus
but presents them as sayings of James. It contains an important argument
against the doctrine of "salvation through faith" expounded in the Epistle
of Paul to the Romans. We can thus conclude that it was written during
the first half of the second century C.E., after Romans but before
the time that Matthew and Luke were accepted by all Christians.
Thus regardless of which James is intended, the Epistle of James
is pseudepigraphic. It says almost nothing about Jesus and there is no
evidence that the author had any historical sources for him.

There are three epistles named after the apostle John. None of them
are in fact written in the name of John and were probably only ascribed
to him some time after they had been written. The First Epistle of John,
like the Epistle to the Hebrews, is completely anonymous. The idea
that it was written by John arises from the fact that it used the Gospel
of John as a source. The other two epistles named after John are written
by a single author who, instead of writing in the name of an apostle, chose
simply to call himself "the Elder." The idea that these two epistles were
written by John arose from the beliefs that "the Elder" referred to John
the Elder and that he was the same person as the apostle John. In the case
of the Second Epistle of John this belief was reinforced by the
fact that that epistle also uses the Gospel of John as a source.
We can thus conclude that the first two epistles ascribed to John were
written after the Gospel of John (c. 110 – 120 C.E.). Consequently
none of the three epistles could have been written by the apostle John.
It should be pointed out that it is quite possible that the pseudonym "the
Elder" does refer to the person named John the Elder, but if this is so,
he is certainly not the apostle John. The first two John epistles use only
the Gospel of John as a source for Jesus; they do not use any legitimate
sources. The Third Epistle of John barely mentions "Christ" and
there is no evidence that it used any historical sources for him.

Besides the epistles named after John, the New Testament also contains
a book known as the Revelation to John. This book combines two forms
of religious writing, that of the epistle and that of the apocalypse. (Apocalypses
are religious works which are written in the form of revelations about
the future made by a famous character from the past. These revelations
usually describe unfortunate events occurring at the time of writing and
also offer some hope to the reader that things will improve.) It is not
certain how much editing the Revelation to John underwent and so
it is difficult to date it precisely. Since it mentions the persecutions
instigated by Nero we can say with certainty that it was not written earlier
than 64 C.E, thus it cannot have been written by the "real" John. The first
few verses form an introduction which is clearly not intended to be by
John and which provides a vague admission that the book is pseudepigraphic
even though the author feels that his message is inspired by God. The style
of writing and the references to the practice of kriobolium (baptism in
sheep’s blood) suggests that the author was one of those people of Jewish
descent who mixed Judaism with pagan practices. There were many such "pagan
Jews" during Roman times and it was these people who become the first converts
to Christianity, established the first churches, and who were probably
also responsible for introducing pagan myths into the story of Jesus. (They
are also remembered for their ridiculous belief that "Adonai Tzevaot"
was the same as the pagan god "Sebazios.") The references to Jesus
in the book are few and there is no evidence that they are based on anything
but belief.

Besides the epistles accepted in the New Testament and the epistles
which are unanimously recognized as being of no value (such as the Epistle
of Barnabas), there are also several epistles which although not accepted
in the New Testament, are considered of value by some Christians. Firstly
there are the epistles named after Clement. In Christian legend, Clement
was the third in succession of Peter as bishop of Rome. The First Epistle
of Clement to the Corinthians is not in fact written in the name of
Clement but in the name of the "Church of God which sojourns in Rome."
It refers to a persecution which is generally thought to have occurred
in 95 C.E. under Domitian, and it refers to the dismissal of the elders
of the Church of Corinth in c. 96 C.E. Christians believe that Clement
was bishop of Rome during this time and this is apparently the reason why
the epistle was later named after him. Fundamentalist Christians believe
that the epistle was in fact written in c. 96 C.E. This date is not possible
since the epistle refers to bishops and priests as separate groups; a division
which had not taken place yet. Stylistic considerations show that it was
written in c. 125 C.E. As references it used the Epistle to the Hebrews
and The First Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians but no legitimate
historical sources. The Second Epistle of Clement is by a different
author to the first and was written later. We may thus conclude that it
was also not written by Clement. (There is no evidence that either of these
epistles were named after Clement before their incorporation into the collection
of books known as the Codex Alexandrinus in the fifth century C.E.)
As sources for Jesus, the Second Epistle of Clement uses the Gospel
of the Egyptians, a document which is rejected by even the most fundamentalist
Christians, and also the New Testament books which we have shown to be
valueless. Thus again we have no legitimate evidence of Jesus.

Next we have the epistles written in the name of Ignatius. According
to legend, Ignatius was the bishop of Antioch who was killed under Trajan's
rule c. 110 C.E. (Although he is probably based on a real historical person,
the legends about his martyrdom are largely fictional.) There are fifteen
epistles written in his name. Of these, eight are unanimously recognized
as being pseudepigraphic and of no value as regards Jesus. The remaining
seven each have two forms, a longer and a shorter. The longer forms are
clearly altered and edited versions of the shorter forms. Fundamentalist
Christians claim that the shorter forms are genuine letters written by
Ignatius. The Epistle of Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans mentions the
threefold ordering of bishops, priests and deacons which had not yet taken
place by Ignatius's death which occurred no later than 117 C.E. and which
probably took place c. 110 C.E. All seven shorter epistles attack various
Christian beliefs, now considered heretical, which only became prevalent
c. 140 – 150 C.E. The shorter Epistle of Ignatius to the Romans
contains a quote from the writings of Irenaeus, written after 170 C.E.
and published c. 185 C.E. We can thus conclude that the seven shorter epistles
are also pseudepigraphic. The shorter Epistle of Ignatius to the Romans
was certainly written after 170 C.E. (In fact, if it was not written by
Irenaeus then it was probably written after c. 185 C.E.) The other six
were written no earlier than the period c. 140 - 150 C.E., if not later.
There are no sources for Jesus in the Ignatian epistles other than the
New Testament books and the writings of Irenaeus which only use the New
Testament. Thus they contain no legitimate evidence of Jesus.

There are two more epistles which Christians claim are genuine letters,
namely the Epistle of Polycarp and the Martyrdom of Polycarp.
The Ignatian epistles and the epistles concerning Polycarp have always
been closely associated. It is quite possible that they were all written
by the Christian writer Irenaeus and his disciples. There certainly was
a real historical early Christian named Polycarp. He was bishop of Smyrna
and was killed by the Romans sometime in the period 155 - 165 C.E. When
Irenaeus was a boy he knew Polycarp. Fundamentalist Christians claim that
Polycarp was the disciple of the apostle John. However, even if we accept
the legend that Polycarp lived to the age of 86, he could not have been
born earlier than 67 C.E and therefore could not have been a disciple of
John. (It is possible that he was a disciple of the enigmatic John the
Elder.) Since Irenaeus had known Polycarp they also assume that Irenaeus
was in fact his disciple, a claim for which there is no evidence. The
Epistle of Polycarp uses most New Testament books and the Ignatian
epistles as references but it uses no legitimate sources for Jesus. Those
Christians who reject the Ignatian epistles but believe the Epistle
of Polycarp is a genuine letter, claim that the references to the Ignatian
epistles are a later interpolation. This idea is based on personal bias,
not on any genuine evidence. Based on the blind belief that this epistle
is a genuine letter, some Christians date it to around the middle of the
second century C.E., shortly before Polycarp's death. However, the references
to the Ignatian epistles suggest that it was in fact written some time
in the last few decades of the second century C.E., at least about a decade
after Polycarp's death if not later.

The Martyrdom of Polycarp is written in the name of "the Church
of God that sojourns in Smyrna." It starts off in the form of a letter
but its main body is written in the form of an ordinary story. It tells
the tale of Polycarp's martyrdom. Like the Epistle of Polycarp,
it was written some time during the last few decades of the second century
C.E. Unfortunately, there is no evidence that it used any reliable sources
for its story, only rumors and hearsay. The story in fact appears to be
highly fictionalized. The references to Jesus are not taken from any reliable
source.

We have thus seen that the epistles used by missionaries as "evidence"
are just as spurious as the gospels. Again, the reader should beware "easy
to understand" translations of the New Testament since they call the epistles
"letters," thereby incorrectly implying that they are really letters written
by the people after whom they are named.

Now, besides the books of the New Testament, and besides the epistles
relating to Clement, Ignatius and Polycarp, there is only one more Christian
religious work which Christians claim as historical evidence of Jesus,
namely the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles also known as the Didache.
All other early Christian religious works are either wholly rejected by
modern Christians or are at least recognized as not being primary sources
as regards Jesus. The Didache began as a sectarian Jewish document,
probably written during the period of turmoil in c. 70 C.E. Its earliest
form consisted of moral teachings and predictions of the destruction of
the current world order. This earliest version, which obviously did not
mention Jesus, was taken over by Christians who heavily edited and altered
it, adding a story of Jesus and rules of worship for early Christian communities.
Scholars estimate that the earliest Christian version of the _Didache_
could not have been written much later than 95 C.E. It probably only reached
its final form around c. 120 C.E. It appears to have served an isolated
Christian community in Syria as a "Church Order" during the period c. 100
- 130 C.E. However, there is no evidence that its story of Jesus was based
on any reliable sources, and as we have mentioned, the earliest Jewish
version had nothing to do with Jesus. In fact, this document provides evidence
that the myth of Jesus grew gradually. Like the Gospel of Mark and
the early versions of Gospel of Matthew, the Jesus story in the
Didache makes no mention of a virgin birth. It makes no mention
of the fantastic miracles which were later attributed to Jesus. Although
Jesus is referred to as a "son" of God, it appears that this term is being
used figuratively. The evidence we have concerning the origin of the crucifixion
myth suggests that one of the things leading to this myth was the fact
that the cross was the astrological symbol of the Vernal Equinox which
occurs near Passover, when Jesus was believed to have been killed. It is
thus not surprising to find that the story in the Didache makes
no mention of Jesus being crucified, although it mentions a cross in the
sky as a sign of Jesus. The twelve apostles mentioned in the full title
of the Didache do not appear as twelve real disciples of Jesus and
the term clearly refers to the twelve sons of Jacob representing the twelve
tribes of Israel. Thus the Didache provides vital clues concerning
the growth of the Jesus myth, but it certainly does not provide any evidence
of an historical Jesus.

Since none of the Christian religious texts provide any acceptable evidence
of Jesus, missionaries turn next to non-Christian texts. Christians claim
that several reliable historians recorded information about Jesus. Although
some of these historians are more or less accepted, we shall see that they
do not provide any information about Jesus.

Firstly, Christians claim that the Jewish historian Josephus recorded
information about Jesus in his book Jewish Antiquities (published
c. 93 - 94 C.E.) It is true that this book contains information about the
three false Messiahs, Yehuda of Galilee, Theudas and Benjamin the Egyptian,
and it is true that the character of Jesus appears to be based on all of
them in part, but none of them can be regarded as the historical Jesus.
Moreover, in the book of Acts, these people are mentioned as being
different people to Jesus and so modern Christianity actually rejects any
connection between them and Jesus. In the Christian edited versions of
the Jewish Antiquities there are two passages dealing with Jesus
as portrayed in Christian religious works. Neither of these passages are
found in the original version of the Jewish Antiquities which was
preserved by the Jews. The first passage (XVII, 3, 3) was quoted by Eusebius
writing in c. 320 C.E. and so we can conclude that it was added in some
time between the time Christians got hold of the Jewish Antiquities
and c. 320 C.E. It is not known when the other passage (XX, 9, 1) was added
in. Neither passage is based on any reliable sources. It is fraudulent
to claim that these passages were written by Josephus and that they provide
evidence for Jesus. They were written by Christian redactors and were based
purely on Christian belief.

Next the Christians will point to the Annals by Tacitus. In the
Annals XV,44, Tacitus describes how Nero blamed the Christians for
the fire of Rome in 64 C.E. He mentions that the name "Christians" originated
from a person named Christus who had been executed by Pontius Pilate during
the reign of Tiberias. It is certainly true that the name "Christians"
is derived from Christ or Christus (Messiah), but Tacitus' claim that he
was executed by Pilate during the reign of Tiberias is based purely on
the claims being made by the Christians themselves. They appeared in the
gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke, which had already
been widely circulated when the Annals were being written. (The
Annals were published after 115 C.E. and were certainly not written
before 110 C.E.) Thus, although the Annals contains a sentence in
which "Christus" is spoken of as a real person, this sentence was based
purely on Christian claims and beliefs which are of no historical value.
It is quite ironic that modern Christians use Tacitus to back up their
beliefs since he was the least accurate of all Roman historians. He justifies
hatred of Christians by saying that they committed abominations. Besides
"Christus" he also speaks of various pagan gods as if they really exist.
His summary of Middle East history in his book the Histories is
so distorted as to be laughable. We may conclude that his single mention
of Christus cannot be taken as reliable evidence of an historical Jesus.

Once Tacitus is dismissed, the Christians will claim that one of the
younger Pliny's letters to the emperor Trajan provides evidence of an historical
Jesus. (Letters X, 96.) This is nonsense. The letter in question
simply mentions that certain Christians had cursed "Christ" to avoid being
punished. It does not claim that this Christ really existed. The letter
in question was written before Pliny's death in c. 114 C.E. but after he
was sent to Bithynia in 111 C.E., probably in the year 112 C.E. Thus it
provides nothing more than a confirmation of the trivial fact that around
the beginning of the twelfth decade C.E. Christians did not normally curse
something called "Christ" although some had done it to avoid punishment.
It provides no evidence of an historical Jesus.

Christians will also claim that Suetonius recorded evidence of Jesus
in his book Lives of the Caesars (also known as The Twelve Caesars).
The passage in question is Claudius 25, where he mentions that the
emperor Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome (apparently in 49 C.E.) because
they caused continual disturbances at the instigation of a certain Chrestus.
If one blindly assumes that "Chrestus" refers to Jesus then, if anything,
this passage contradicts the Christian story of Jesus. Jesus was supposed
to have been crucified when Pontius Pilate was procurator (26 - 36 C.E.)
during the reign of Tiberias and, moreover, he was never supposed to have
been in Rome! Suetonius lived during the period c. 75 - 150 C.E. and his
book, Lives of the Caesars, was published during the period 119
- 120 C.E., having been written some time after Domitian's death in 96
C.E. Thus the event he describes occurred at least 45 years before he was
writing about it and so we cannot be certain of its accuracy. The name
Chrestus is derived from the Greek Chrestos meaning "good one" and
it is not the same as Christ or Christus which are derived from the Greek
Christos meaning "anointed one/Messiah." If we take the passage
at face value it refers to a person named Chrestus who was in Rome and
who had nothing to do with Jesus or any other "Christ." The term Chrestos
was often applied to pagan gods and many of the people in Rome called "Jews"
were actually people who mixed Jewish beliefs with pagan beliefs and who
were not necessarily of Jewish descent. Thus it is also possible that the
passage refers to conflicts involving these pagan "Jews" who worshipped
a pagan god (such as Sebazios) titled Chrestos. On the other hand, the
words Chrestos and Christos were often confused and so the passage might
even be referring to some conflict involving Jews who believed that some
person was the Messiah. This person may or may not have actually been in
Rome and for all we know, he may not even have been a real historical person.
One should bear in mind that the described event took place just several
years after the crucifixion of the false Messiah Theudas in 44 C.E., and
the passage may be referring to his followers in Rome. Christians claim
that the passage refers to Jesus and conflicts arising after Paul brought
news of him to Rome and that Suetonius was only mistaken about Jesus himself
being in Rome. However, this interpretation is based on blind belief in
Jesus and the myths about Paul and there is nothing to suggest that it
is the correct interpretation. Thus we may conclude that Suetonius also
fails to provide any reliable evidence of an historical Jesus.

All other writers who mention Jesus, from Justin Martyr in the second
century C.E. to the latest expounders of Christian myth in the twentieth
century, have all based their references to Jesus on the sources we have
discredited above. Consequently their claims are worthless as historical
evidence. We are thus left with the conclusion that there is absolutely
no reliable and acceptable historical evidence of Jesus. All references
to Jesus are derived from the superstitious beliefs and myths of the early
Christian community. The majority of these beliefs only came into existence
after the persecution by Nero and the tragedy of 70 C.E. Many of these
beliefs are based on the pagan legends about the gods Tammuz, Osiris, Attis,
Dionysus and the sun god Mithras. Other myths about Jesus appear to be
based on various different historical people such as the convicted criminals
Yeishu ben Pandeira and ben Stada, and the crucified false Messiahs Yehuda,
Theudas and Benjamin, but none of these people can be regarded as an historical
Jesus.

*FURTHER READING*

1) J. Allegro, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Christian Myth,
Prometheus Books, reprinted 1991. (Examines how ancient myths were misused
by the early church and misrepresented as history.)

3) E.D. Cohen, The Mind of the Bible-Believer, Prometheus Books,
reprinted 1991. (Uncovers the psychological ploys around which the New
Testament is built and exposes the adverse effects of Christian fundamentalism.)

5) S. Levine, You Take Jesus and I'll Take God: How to Refute Christian
Missionaries, revised edition, Hamoroh Press, Los Angeles, 1980. (Exposes
the tricks used by missionaries and the misquotations of the Tanach in
the New Testament.)

6) J.M. Robertson, A Short History of Christianity, 2nd
Ed., Watts & Co., London 1913. (One of the first serious academic investigations
into the origins of Christianity. Exposes the elements of the Jesus story
borrowed from pagan myths.)

7) The Talmud, should be compulsory reading for all Jews although
it is unfortunately neglected in modern times!